At the recent NATO summit in Bucharest, where the U.S. fared better on missile defense and other issues than many pundits had predicted, some of the best commentary on the current situation came from the newer members. The setting accentuated the effect. Consider these quotes, from a Christian Science Monitor piece:
After the cold war and under the rule of President Boris Yeltsin, the expansion of NATO eastward into Russian spheres of influence took place with scant thought for Moscow’s opinion. Yet Putin has so changed this position that East European members of NATO, who feel they understand the Russian bear better, are critical of what they often term NATO’s “appeasement” of Moscow by older NATO states who are wary of allowing Ukraine and Georgia to join.
“We seem to want a strategic partnership with a country that targets us every time we say we disagree with it,” said Estonian President Toomas Ilves, whose country recently endured a cyberattack from Russia that shut down the Internet for a week. “I think we should take Russia more seriously.”
NATO officials agreed to set up a cyberattacks defense group, along with an energy-security team, a result of concern over Russia.
And how about this key point:
Polish foreign minister Radoslaw Sikorski responding to the question of such hard fighting in the summit hallways, said that vigorous debate and disagreements were perfectly acceptable if not desirable inside NATO. “It is an alliance of free nations….In the Warsaw Pact we had no disagreement.”